Partners: use a product key to set up a customer subscription

Now that you've purchased product keys for Office 365, you can redeem them and set up an Office 365 subscription for your customer. After you've done that, you can add users and migrate the customer's email and data to Office 365. If your client adds your partner of record (POR) number to the subscription, you are eligible for additional partner benefits and can offer delegated administration to your customer.

Note: This article is for Office 365 partners. If you're looking for help with your Office 365 product key, but you're not a partner, see Find and enter your product key for Office 365 for business.

What do you want to do?

Redeem an Office 365 product key and set up your customer's Office 365 subscription

Manage your customer's account at subscription renewal time

Redeem an Office 365 product key and set up your customer's Office 365 subscription

After you have obtained an Office 365 product key for your customer, you can redeem the product key and create the Office 365 subscription.

Notes: 

• When you set up the Office 365 subscription, enter user information for the person in the customer's organization who will be the admin for the organization. When you create the subscription, the person whose information you entered is automatically given admin rights and is assigned an Office 365 license.

• If you are the delegated admin for the customer, you are assigned admin rights when you set yourself up as the delegated admin. However, you don't need an Office 365 license to administer the customer's subscription on their behalf.

What is an Office 365 product key and how do I use it?   

An Office 365 product key is a unique 25-character alpha-numeric code that you can use to activate an Office 365 subscription, add users , and renew an Office 365 subscription. If you're a partner who is authorized to sell Office 365, you can purchase Office 365 product key cards through the Microsoft Open programs.

Note:  All partners can sell Office 365 as long as they establish a reseller relationship with an authorized distributor. For more information about Microsoft Volume Licensing, the Microsoft Open License programs, and selling Office 365, see Microsoft Volume Licensing.

Procedure	Steps
Redeem Office 365 product keys	Complete the following procedure to redeem the product keys for your customer. Go to Redeem Office 365 product keys. Read the instructions, click I understand I'm the right person to be doing this for my organization, and then click Start. Type an Office 365 product key. If you have additional product keys to add, click Add another product key, add the rest of your product keys, and then click Next. On the Everything look right? page, review the information you entered, and then click Done adding product keys. Important: Don't close your browser window until you have completed the next few steps. If you close your browser window, you will have to redeem your product keys again. After you've finished entering your product keys, create your customer's Office 365 subscription by completing the following steps. On the Get started page, click Start step 2 to start creating your account. Type the required information for the admin in the customer's organization, including the country or region, organization name, and the admin's name. Note:  If your country or region isn't listed, there's no Office 365 service there. After you've completed the required information, click Create my account. You can now start adding users and migrating email and data to Office 365 for your customer's organization. You can complete these tasks now or at a later time. For more information about how to add users, set up email, add a domain, and other tasks for your customer, see: Set up Office 365 for business
Send an offer for delegated administration to your customer	To have full administrative access to all your customer's services and subscriptions, you must be a delegated admin for the customer. To become a delegated admin, do the following. At the top of the Admin center page, click Partner. On the Partner overview page, click Send delegated administration offers. Create the message to offer delegated administration to your customer, and send it to your customer. The customer must accept your offer before you can perform any administration tasks on behalf of the customer. For more information about sending an offer for delegated administration to your customer, see Offer delegated administration. Note:  You must be enrolled in the Microsoft Cloud Essentials program to be eligible to offer delegated administration. For more information, see Microsoft Cloud Essentials program.

Manage your customer's subscription at subscription renewal time

The customer and you, if you are listed as the customer's POR, start receiving subscription renewal notices 60 days, 30 days, 7 days, and 1 day prior to when subscriptions expire.

When your customer's subscription is about to expire, you can help your customer renew their Office 365 subscription with a product key to continue directly billing the customer. You can also choose to switch your customer to direct billing from Microsoft. If the subscription is renewed by using direct billing, the new subscription starts immediately. In this case, customers shouldn't renew their subscription until right before it expires.

If a customer doesn't renew their subscription in time, they can still use Office 365 for 30 days after the subscription expiration date. The customer can reactivate the subscription and their data will be retained until 120 days after the expiration date. To learn more about what to expect when a subscription expires, see What happens to my data and access when my Office 365 for business subscription ends?.

For more information, see Sell to and service Microsoft Cloud customers.